RED SOX SWEEP EXHIBITION GAMES

It's hard to believe that the start of the season is less than 24 hours away...and a few thousand miles away on another continent.

The Red Sox beat the Hanshin Tigers 6-5 on Friday, behind a lackluster start from Buchholz. The Sox scored 4 runs in the first, added a 5th in the 2nd, and their final run in the 6th. Buchholz was tagged for 4 runs off 6 hits and a pair of walks in 3.2 innings. But Kyle Snyder bailed him out big time. Snyder came in with the bases juiced, but stranded all three men. Javier Lopez, Manny Delcarmen, and Papelbon each threw a scoreless inning of relief.

The Sox won with the longball. Ortiz hit a solo shot in the first, and a few batters later Drew belted a 3 run blast.

Drew had a big "night" on Sunday, as well, against the Yomiuri Giants. JD hit a 6th inning Grand Slam off American minor league journeyman Adrian Burnside to put the Sox ahead 4-2. In the two game series, Drew was 2 for 7 with 7 RBI, more than half the Red Sox offensive output. Grab him in your fantasy leagues, he's available and will have a good year.



Jed Lowrie also hit a homerun. Brandon Moss was 2 for 2 with a double and 2 RBI. Youkilis was 2 for 3, and Crisp went 1 for 5 with a triple. Wakefield started and went 5.2 innings, yielding 2 runs (only 1 earned) off 5 hits, and a walk. He struck out 3. Okajima pitched a scoreless inning against his former team (don't get to say that often with Hideki). David Aardsma pitched around a jam he created, and Tavarez tossed a scoreless 9th.



The A's also swept their games with Hanshin and Yomiuri, albeit to smaller crowds.

I would have loved to see these games, maybe ESPN could have tape delayed them for us? They're already over there for the regular season games, why not broadcast an extremely rare thing like David Ortiz face Testuya Utsumi in front of 44,000 Japanese? I guess The Deuce wanted to use their precious broadcasting time to show Skip Bayliss arguing with his breakfast cereal.

Sources:
BostonRedSox.com
MLB.com
The Baseball Cube

Photo Credits:
Junko Kimura/Getty Images
AP Photo/Koji Sasahara
Globe Staff Photo / Barry Chin